Celebrating KWANZAA
Pastor hosts event honoring family, culture
For nearly two decades, a local single mother and pastor continues investing time and money to unite African-Americans and highlight positive people in the community during Kwanzaa. The Rev. Charlotte S.N. Williams will host the annual citywide Kwanzaa celebration at 3 p.m. today at Eastdale Village Community Church, where she is pastor.
Williams is among only 1.25 percent of African-Americans who say they still celebrate the holiday honoring family, community and culture, according to Keith Mayes, author and assistant professor of History and African American and African Studies at the University of Minnesota.
The count was at 2.3 percent in 2006, according to the National Retail Federation.
Some organizations report that the observance is in decline as supporters of the 1960s black-power movement age and die. When support for the holiday thrived in the 1980s and 1990s, Kwanzaa cards and materials sold in several major stores, but now such merchandise is harder to find.
Yet Williams continues with her quest, one of an estimated 5 million Americans who say the seven-day observance is too important to end.
“The reason Kwanzaa has to be celebrated is because, as African-Americans in this country, we were stripped of our culture, of our names, of our religions, of our families, of our identity. Everything that makes us a human being was taken from us because enslavement was a process of dehumanization,” says Williams.
“And so Kwanzaa reclaims that humanity and reminds us of the sacredness of our bodies, of our minds, of our souls, of our families and of our identity. We can’t allow ourselves to fall in the category of the people’s definition of who we are. We have to define ourselves from that which we were created, and that was from God,” she says.
California State University Africana Studies professor and chair Maulana Karenga founded Kwanzaa in 1966 at the height of the black nationalist movement.
Each year the seven-day observance starts the day after Christmas, Dec. 26, and ends New
“The reason Kwanzaa has to be celebrated is because, as African-Americans in this country, we were stripped of our culture, of our names, of our religions, of our families, of our identity. Everything that makes us a human being was taken from us because enslavement was a process of dehumanization.”
The Rev. Charlotte S.N. Williams
Year’s Day, Jan. 1.
Kwanzaa has seven core principles, and each of the seven days is dedicated to one of the principles. They are: Umoja (Unity), Kujichagulia (Self-Determination), Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility), Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics), Nia (Purpose), Kuumba (Creativity) and Imani (Faith).
The goal is to reflect on the past and consider the seven principles and ways to implement them in the present and while planning for the future.
Seven local people will be recognized for exemplifying those principles during today’s celebration. They are Wilhelmina Hogg, Alice F. Williams, Alice L. Williams, Harold Bush, Henry Slayton, Gwenefred Williams and Julian Fairbanks.
Enslavement was a chapter in the lives of African-Americans but not the entire book, says the Rev. Williams.
“Kwanzaa reminds us that we were a people, a civilization that lived and prospered before we were stolen and brought here to America and to Central America,” she says. “Kwanzaa reminds us that we are family. Those slave ships landed in Jamaica, Barbados, Trinidad and South Carolina. We were just dropped in different ports. But we are one.”
Contact Yolanda Putman at yputman@ timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6431.